Coffee, TEA or errmm… never mind… This month’s edition of IMBB is brought to you by Clement of A La Cuisine! What a wonderful theme for one can drink tea, season with it, boil in it and even eat it.

Tea, strictly speaking, is the plant Camella sinensis which is native to China. The beverage known as tea, however, has evolved through the centuries to even include leaves of fruit trees, herbs and spices. There must be a myriad of tea concoctions out in the market which can be personalised according to individual tastes. I have my own personal favourites but what I will present now is the first “tea” that I knew of. Tsaang gubat or wild tea (Carmona retusa (Vahl) Masam) is not a tea plant but taken as tea it is. It is a plant with small white flowers which is commonly found in Southeast Asia. The Department of Science and Technology has a page on its Techno-Catalog section.

As a child, my playmates and I ate or pretended to cook with the ripened fruits which we picked off the multi-branched shrub. The small berry-like fruits had a sweetish tartness and a ‘bubbly’ texture. My grandmother had a constant supply of dried leaves which were brewed and taken in the mornings or afternoons or as a decoction for stomach aches.
Read the rest of this entry »

Food embodies the culture from which it developed. To know a culture, one can start with food. The past year has seen the food blogging community grow tremendously. Each month, I look forward to the Is My Blog Burning? events which reveal some facets of other cultures through their food and eating habits. The sub-events have grown in number, with themes based on ingredients, aesthetics or culture.

A lighthearted discussion of the above, among others, between Filipino food bloggers has kindled the desire for Filipino food to make its mark on the world culinary map. Thus was born Lasang Pinoy, which could mean it ‘tastes of something Filipino’ or short for ‘the Filipino taste’.

Launching Lasang Pinoy on Ninoy Aquino Day

The year 1983 was a turning point for the Philippines. On the 21st of August was the culmination of a man’s fight to gain his country’s freedom. The day Sen. Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino, Jr. died, Filipinos everywhere were at last emboldened to find their voice to break from the shackles of fear. Ninoy joins the ranks of our greatest heroes in giving us the legacy of our freedom. On his 22nd death anniversary, we celebrate his heroism and dedication to the Filipino nation. In him we have a modern-day hero whose self-sacrifice is worth emulating especially during these days of instability.

For their part, Filipino food bloggers the world over will launch on Ninoy Aquino Day the first Lasang Pinoy Food Blogging Event which aims to bring attention to Filipino food. Just like how Ninoy had much faith in the Filipino, enough to die for us, we are proud to be Filipinos.
Read the rest of this entry »

Comments from the previous post made me realise that eating fruits with plain rice must have been a common practice a generation or two ago. I don’t know many people who still do. In our family it died with my grandmother. This habit is one of the things I did not appreciate her teaching me as a child, palatably speaking. I suppose it’s just like eating ripe mangoes with suman but still… you know! Lola ate fruits, almost any kind – mangoes, guavas, chicos, pineapples, watermelon – with a cup of rice and a little salt or baguc (bagoong). Mind you, this was dessert for her. My brother and I complained to our mother when she came home that Lola would make us eat rice with our fruits. Mom would amusedly tell us to just let Lola know we ate a good amount of rice with our fish or meat and vegetables then have our fruits as we pleased. Apparently, mom was with us on this, so were her siblings. Lola was outnumbered.

Toni mentioned her grandmother ate her fruits with rice too. Joey says similarly, her lola’s fruits were on the plate that they practically mixed with the rice. Over in Kuala Lumpur, I read that Babe’s grandmother taught her to eat durian with hot white plain rice but it was just durian, no other fruit. Now I’d like to hear from you:

1. Does anyone in your family eat their fruits with plain rice?
2. If yes, how long ago was this?
3. From which part of the Philippines /world did this fruit habit come from? (If you can trace it.)

I suspect this is a Filipino, if not a Southeast Asian trait but who knows? If you would ever be so kind, if you are so inclined, would you ask others about this too? This is not a formal survey (obviously, Karen you silly girl!) but the morbidly curious obsessive-compulsive nerd that I am would like to know.

Thank you! Now, would you be so kind? Answers need not be limited by the questions. I would love to hear your stories. It would be a refreshing change from my rambling, no?